Only two days before the start of the fifth Budapest-Bamako rally, officials of the Foreign Ministry issued a warning over the threat of terrorism in Mauritania and Mali and requested organisers to scrap all the stages of the race beyond the Moroccan border.
As of last Friday (when this edition of The Budapest Times went to press) it was still unknown what the terrorism threat will mean to the world’s largest Trans Sahara rally. At Thursday’s press conference, main organiser András Polgár shared the warning of the Foreign Ministry with reporters and added that the “Grand Departure” ceremony on Saturday will definitely take place, although the rally is likely to take a different route.
In 2008, the Lisbon-Dakar rally was eventually cancelled due to the possibility of terrorist attacks. The main difference, however, is that two years ago the threat was issued specifically against the Dakar, while this time the Hungarian ministry’s notice was more of a general warning. Seeing that Mali is the destination of the race and on the eastern coast of Africa it is impossible to avoid Mauritania, a route change is among the more difficult options. In 2010 the participants of the two categories will travel on different routes. The racing route will feature scenic, but demanding off-road sections while the touring route will allow teams to discover towns and explore local culture.
With the Dakar’s departure from Africa, the Budapest-Bamako “Great African Run” is now the world’s largest trans-Saharan rally.
Nonetheless, organisers and participants remain committed to the original low-cost and charity principles. This year’s participants form a truly international crowd, including racers from dozens of countries.
Englishman Graham Standring will take a black London taxicab to Africa while Paul Wood (UK) will attempt to go the more than 9,000 kilometre distance in a 1957 VW Beetle. “When we started looking this actually was the first ‘oval’ we came across, but it’s never a good idea to buy the first car you find so we kept on looking. It seemed like all the ovals are either fully restored, or need a full restoration and there’s very little in between – so after some deliberation we settled on this. And it’s black, which is cool”, he added.
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